Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and ‘X’ has reacted to Sam Altman’s statements on Suchir Balaji’s death. Tesla CEO responded to OpenAI CEO Sam Altman on the aforementioned issue in a post on ‘X’. Elon Musk has always been critical of Sam Altman and his startup OpenAI, but this time, there seems to be substance in his argument and allegations.
In a post on ‘X’, Elon Musk wrote “He was Murdered”, meanwhile citing a clip of Sam Altman’s interview where the OpenAI CEO says that Suchir Balaji’s death was a suicide. Although Sam Altman has not reacted to Elon Musk’s allegations of murder, he maintains his stance on the issue.
He was murdered https://t.co/KDaomi5AlJ
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) September 11, 2025
What did Sam Altman say?
Sam Altman was recently seen in an interview with former Fox News anchor Tucker Carlson. In the Interview, the anchor asked, “Do you think he committed suicide?”. The OpenAI CEO replied by saying that ‘I really do’, he also added that “He was like a friend of mine. This is like a guy that, not a close friend, but this is someone that worked at OpenAI for a very long time. I was really shaken by this tragedy. I spent a lot of time trying to, you know, read everything I could, as I’m sure you and others did too, about what happened. It looks like a suicide to me.”
Who is Suchir Balaji?
Suchir is a 26-year-old researcher at ChatGPT-parent OpenAI who was found dead at his apartment in San Francisco in December last year. The police then said that “no evidence of foul play was found during the initial investigation”. The San Francisco Chief Medical Examiner’s Office also ruled his death a suicide.
However, Suchir Balaji’s parents kept reiterating that his death was not a suicide. Balaji’s mother, Poornima Rao, in a Business Insider article revealed that Balaji had grown increasingly disillusioned with artificial intelligence (AI), particularly OpenAI’s shift toward commercialization with ChatGPT.
